The Middle of the Road
by MH
Summary: Rind must protect an ordinary human noticed by the wrong people. The mission is so easy it’s an insult, but events complicate matters. Her charge’s 9to5 life has just gotten interesting, and no wish was necessary! Please review. Email is welcome.
1. Ah! My Disclaimer!

Disclaimer. Part 1.

Most characters within were created by Kosuke Fujishima.

Disclaimer. Part 2.

My OC is something of a Marty Stu or whatever you prefer to call the male equivalent of a Mary Sue. I created him before I knew such a categorization existed and am not going to make extensive changes just because some characteristics apply. The story was born from an "author self-insertion" idea, but it is my hope that I modified it to not be so blatant. Keep in mind, even if I made my protagonist a carbon copy of me, it is pure speculation as to how "I" would behave when confronted with the events in this story.

Part 2a.

This is a sort of a trial run anyway. If there are overwhelmingly negative reviews, I'll desist. Otherwise I'll keep posting chapters when I am able to properly divide up extant material. As it is, the opener is a bit long.

Disclaimer. Part 3.

There are spoilers in this story so avert thine eyes if you have trouble forgetting details that may or may not be important to you when at last you've seen all there is to see of the manga and anime. Specifically, if you do not know who Rind, Hild, or Welsper are, and don't want to find out from me, turn away now. I know I'm limiting my audience, but it is helpful to have read as far as the chapter in which a certain cat does something to get rid of white spots in its fur. This is in Volume 29 somewhere. But the beginning of Volume 27 is good enough (chapter 171 to be precise). If you ignore my advice and read anyway, rest assured I'll do everything I can to make sure you're not horribly lost.


	2. A Slap on the Wrist

Pangs of regret and loneliness followed Rind as she sped away from Earth, never able to bore far enough through her discipline to give her pause. Duty ahead, friends behind. She had always believed she would never find herself in that situation and thus had kept her socializing, such as it had been, within the ranks of the Valkyries. Friends were impediments to any warrior unless she could put them from her mind when duty called. Though capable, Rind still could not do this. She had promised Keiichi that she would return and breaking a promise to a new lifelong friend was no way to begin, or end.

How long might it be until she had a break, when she could return? Would her duties outlast Keiichi's anticipation? No, the question was _could_ they? Making friends may have been a mistake, but her choice of friends was not. Should it take fifty years, Keiichi would greet as though she had only been gone a day. He was that kind of person.

And Belldandy, now a sister in the test of strength and character inherent in having two angels. Rind believed the young goddess had the necessary strength to support both Holy Bell and the former devil with her own power. And she had enough emotional support and love. It was true that Belldandy could offer a rare form of companionship because of her new condition, but what Rind wanted most was to be there and guide her in ways the goddess might not be versed in. A powerful discipline was needed, almost ruthless in its extent and design. Without this, Belldandy would find even casual intent escaping her control. Rind knew the goddess's nature alone had no place for heartless dedication, but at least there was little risk of anyone coming to harm because of Belldandy's unintentional excesses. Of further consolation was that while trying to host two angels might not end well, Belldandy was not alone.

Rind pushed her concerns aside as she drew near the Valkyrie's hall. It was a busy time: She landed, reviewed the next entry on her long mission queue, and departed without once seeing another.

* * *

It was another rampaging beast, a shapeshifter, that had for days been terrorizing a crew installing security systems on a remote network node, and then giving Yggdrasil security a hard time when they responded to the menace. Within three minutes of her arrival Rind had relieved the beast of four of its limbs, two of its eyes, and what seemed to be its only tail. Within four minutes it was sealed. Its next stop would be a containment facility where it would await proper identification from the Mystic Beast Research Lab after which it would be tagged and returned to its natural habitat if it proved to be an ordinary monster. As missions went, it was routine and unchallenging, better suited for trainees 

Perhaps that was for the best. Rind wanted time to rest and reflect after her experiences during the tenshikui mission. Though not yet feeling fatigued, before many more missions she knew she would feel the drain.

The goddesses on Yggdrasil security thanked her profusely, all the while looking uneasy in their uniforms now that they stood in the presence of a warrior. She nodded in response to their gratitude, offered an assurance about the strength of the seal on the shapeshifter, and departed.

* * *

Back at the hall, standing at a tree-shaped kiosk at which any Valkyrie could review her list of assignments, Rind found that she had a three-hour break. It was not enough time to return to her quarters and sleep or make good on a promise, but enough to meditate on a quiet, grassy slope somewhere, or perhaps in one of the many forested parks where many gods and goddesses went while on break from their duties. Even there she would remain undisturbed, her station and reputation creating a buffer between herself and the others. She was a Valkyrie, one that enjoyed fighting. A few gods looked upon her kind with plain gratitude; they appreciated the Valkyrie's violent work and that they stood between them and aggression of any kind. But most saw a different class from themselves, or worse, they equated a Valkyrie with the reason for her duty, as though her training in combat created situations in which combat was necessary. Rind had met it all: envy, pity, dutiful respect, mistrust, and apathy. The latter was the worst. It was as though most denizens of the heavens saw no other way to deal with the distasteful issue of aggression and counter-aggression than to look upon those who must fight as machines designed for that only task, built, trained, and set free to do their work; out of sight and out of mind. 

Rind turned away from these thoughts and the consequent memories of solitude and loneliness. She reminded herself that she would take every opportunity to replace those memories with far more pleasant ones through visits to Earth, where there were people who understood that one's purpose, even if violent, was not all there was to know about her.

Before she could decide on a place to meditate the screen flickered and her job queue changed. Her break was replaced by another assignment, at another node, more remote than the last. There were few details save for the one that indicated that this would be an ongoing assignment. It consisted of a week of what amounted to little more than guard duty, a watch for a threat that never appeared.

The one break in the monotony was a communiqué from Peorth on Earth. Belldandy had not been able to control the second angel at all and somehow Keiichi had taken over as host, which had proved even more problematic. The others had realized they had asolution in their midst, but Rind had left the cat sealed. Since it _was_ relatively harmless, and Rind agreedit was best in lieu of being there herself to guide Belldandy, she sent her access codes for thecat'sreleasewithout reservation

Returning, Rind felt as fatigued then as she might have had she actually battled with something the entire time. Again a break was on her schedule, twelve hours this time, and again, it was not to be. Before she could change into her standard dress she saw a younger Valkyrie, a trainee, standing in a short distance away, waiting to be noticed. Rind remembered her name after a second.

"Mist."

"Forgive my intrusion, Rind, but Brunhilde requests to see you at once."

Rind frowned, annoyed but not surprised. It would have been a far simpler matter to leave her a message in her mission queue, but instead the leader of the Valkyries had seen fit to send a trainee, one who had just been through a brutal training session by the looks of her charred and torn uniform. For Mist, this was what Brunhilde called "supplemental training", a means of maintaining readiness and testing stamina even when all one wanted to do was go back to her quarters and collapse into bed. This was, of course, a much smaller nuisance than, say, walking into one's quarters and finding that a simple act as turning on the light has activated a bomb with a five-second timer. Rind recalled every time this had happened to her. A wholehearted devotion to duty wasn't the only reason most Valkyries led such Spartan lives. Brunhilde's occasional surprise "supplemental" sessions necessitated an ascetic lifestyle; more often than not the bomb's were not meant to be defused. Material possessions never lasted long.

"Thank you," she said, moving past Mist, who fell in step behind.

Rind knew that Mist had yet to have the pleasure of entering her own quarters only to be greeted by a serene voice counting backward from five, but having to track someone down after several hours of dodging (not always with success) bolts, axes, and all manner of projectiles wielded and hurled by as many as four trainers was enough of a trial. She glanced back at the trainee.

"Go on to your duties or rest. I am familiar with the location our captain's office."

"Yes, sir. Thank you."

The younger goddess bowed once and disappeared down an adjoining corridor. Rind did not watch her go.

"Sit."

"I believe I will stand."

Brunhilde looked up from her desk as Rind eyed the chair before her. "As you wish," she said.

Rind moved up behind the chair and stood, arms clasped behind her back. From the Valkyrie leader's mild acquiescence she knew at once this was no social call, no performance review (official or otherwise) or supplemental training with an armed chair, and it certainly was not a conference. There were more serious matters here than the propriety of a subordinate when offered a chair.

"I wish to discuss a recent mission of yours. Involving the Tenshikui," Brunhilde began, her attention on a display built into her desk.

"I will make a full report at the earliest posssible—"

"No need. I've gathered all I need to know from Yggdrasil."

On the surface, Rind was expressionless, but inside she frowned. Brunhilde obeyed protocol as closely as her warriors, but this time she had eschewed routine. Rind stood ready in her mind.

"Undserstood."

Now Brunhilde looked up. "Given the Daimakaicho's appearance, you are to be commended for a successful resolution to the crisis."

Rind did not stir despite the temptation to redirect some of the recognition towards those that had stood with her against Hild and her pet. Brunhilde's words did not sound like positive recognition anyway. They had the sound of neutral description, of common occurrence, and of something veiled.

"Furthermore you met this challenge without earning an unmanageable notice from the mortals. As it is, these events occurred at the residence of Keiichi Morisato. Unusual happenings there seem to be the norm for the locals."

The Valkyrie chief smiled. It was humorless and concealing.

_Where is this going?_ Rind thought.

"And bereft of your angels you managed to remain active. Well done." Still Brunhilde's voice was flat, her intent elusive.

_I did what was necessary_, Rind thought.

"However."

_There it is._ Disdain. Contempt. Impatience. Rind could not discern which.

Brunhilde leaned forward. "There are a few important points we need to address. First: the whereabouts of the Tenshikui. Mystic Beast would like to know where their specimen is. More accurately, they want to know why it was sent to Hell instead of being returned to them."

Rind did not reply. She was not expected to.

"Second:" Brunhilde tapped a button on her console and a screen identical to the one before her rose, facing Rind. "Read the third-to-last entry."

It was a list of mission summaries. Rind did as she was bid though both knew the contents of the list.

"Investigate Tenshikui's disappearance from the Mystic Beast Research Lab. Ascertain whereabouts. Report whereabouts and await further instructions and reinforcements."

"Correct. Now, I, and those I delegate command tasks to, yourself included, are quite diligent in recording communications that occur while missions are in progress. Yet nowhere is there record of instructions to travel to Earth, an act that endangered four goddesses and their angels."

Rind looked straight ahead now, waiting for the time, brief as it may be, when she would be allowed to defend her actions.

"Unfortunately the situation at the Morisato residence did not end with the Tenshikui's unauthorized return to Hell. But _that_ is not our concern."

Rind knew better now. That situation _was_ resolved so she did not let her captain's callousness reach her.

"This breach of protocol is uncharacteristic of any Valkyrie, and while a plausible explanation for it may exist in Mystic's visual archives covering the events surrounding the Tenshikui's escape, Mystic has no qualms about laying responsibility for the loss of a valuable specimen on the Valkyries."

"I accept all responsibility and will face disciplinary—" Rind stopped when Brunhilde gave her a dismissive wave.

"I've reviewed the visual record of Mystic. Suffice it to say that you may very well have had little or no say in the proper execution of your mission following your violation by the Tenshikui."

Something stirred inside Rind. A glimmer of forgotten events or perhaps a shudder of emotion from Spearmint's otherwise quiet mind. Outrage. Revulsion. Shame. Rind turned away from those feelings. She remembered well that the thing had been inside her. What she wasn't ready for yet was the memory of how it had gotten inside.

"I will not add to the embarassment of the Valkyries by admitting such weakness," she said.

Another wave of the hand, another cold smile. "Mystic will spin this in whatever way they see fit and will seek disciplinary action against you, that is, if they do not think I have reprimanded you myself."

"Then I await your reprimand."

Brunhilde tapped a few buttons and a thin sheet rose from the desk at a point within reach of anyone sitting across from her. Rind rounded the chair and picked it up. It was a wasteful hardcopy. She would have committed to memory anything appearing on a display, no matter how heavily worded

She glanced at it once. It was a list. She eyed Brunhilde after reading the first entry: 'Travel to Earth to latitude of 33.7724495 North, latitude 112.1338196 West.' The Valkyrie chief was still smiling her cold smile.

"Mystic's suggestion. They thought it important that I be explicit and thorough so that there is not another breach of conduct."

There was something expectant in Brunhilde's face, a barely contained delight. Rind filed it away and decided to save the list for later, when every reaction, no matter how subtle, would be unobserved.

"I request an informal briefing."

"Of course." Brunhilde stood. "You are familiar with the so-called Voice of Earth?"

"Have they begun executing their plans?"

Brunhilde stood and moved to one of the many windows in her office. "No. However, one of their chosen has come to the attention of the demons, specifically one named Izumishita, high-ranking in Hell and rumored to have designs on the position of Daimakaicho."

Rind guessed that this mission had nothing to do with a dead human, so she waited.

"Izumishita believes in most of the Voice of Earth's dire predictions and would like very much to make sure they come to pass. A member of the Voice contacted the aforementioned chosen for reasons unknown. As I said, the Voice has not initiated the 'apotheosis.' From what the Voice has leaked to us via 'anonymous' hacks into Yggdrasil, one of which you dealt with a distraction for following your return form Earth, the informant was a neophyte alarmed by the present Daimakaicho's preoccupation with Earth, and Itzumishita's notice of the same. What transpired between the neophyte and the chosen has not been released, but it appears to be a problem for Itzumishita. The chosen has been targeted by what has been described as a hitokui."

Rind did not flinch, but inside she recoiled. The leader of the Valkyries would claim that this new mission was only an ersatz punishment meant to appease Mystic, but the more she knew of it, the more she was coming to believe that Brunhilde was not merely posturing for Mystic. Still, she forced herself to be calm and reserve judgment for later, when she knew all there was to know.

"The chosen is a mortal," Rind said.

"They all are. This one just had the misfortune of being met by a panicky neophyte."

"Has this hitokui been released?"

"Yes. It will acquire its target within twenty-four hours."

Rind's suspicions stirred again. A hitokui, a man-eater, was already on the loose. And only one mortal was of concern? Something told Rind that the hitokui's tastes were going to be specific.

Brunhilde seemed to have read her thoughts. "We know that the hitokui has been spelled against running rampant amongst the mortals and gorging until it explodes. Izumishita would not wish to call attention to it. It will eat only its intended victim and, given its requirements, recently deceased humans and the occasional animal.

A judgment slipped through. Brunhilde had all but said what came to Rind's mind next.

"I am not to terminate this creature then?" How else would this mission look like a punishment if Rind were not to protect the human?

"Correct. We do not know the full nature of this beast, nor what other methods Izumishita will employ should we simply destroy the hitokui."

_Oh? Will it not perturb the demon to have a valkyrie standing between his monster and the target?_ Rind thought.

"You will remain with the human until we ascertain the extent of Izumishita's interest in this one mortals destruction."

For a moment Rind considered voicing her skepticism about the nature of the mission and her doubts as to the importance of this one human that a valkyrie be sent to protect rather than destroy one threat. But she remained silent. She was not being given a choice. The mission was already hers, and to object now would not only be insubordinate, but it would likely play into whatever game Brunhilde was playing with her.

"Understood."

"Review the mission brief. It contains further information on the hitokui as well as certain crucial mission parameters, which I insist be followed lest we be embarrassed again."

Tight-lipped, Rind said, "Understood."

"Any questions."

_Why are you doing this to me?_

"No."

"Dismissed."

Rind turned and left. She did not realize the extent of her anger until she reached her quarters. Upon opening her door she heard a soft voice come from the farthest corner of her small room.

"Five..."

Spearmint and Cool Mint exploded from her.

"Four..."

Energy was ripped from the room, condensing, then freezing the air within, as well as that which blew in past Rind to fill the resulting vacuum. A shield formed between Rind and her angels, and the source of the voice.

"Three..."

The wall of frozen air surged forward, toward the corner, splintering into jagged projectiles the size of a fist. They struck the walls and floor.

"Tw—"

Silence. No explosion. The angels withdrew. Rind walked forward and stood amongst the rapidly sublimating pieces of ice, nudging a few to one side with her foot to expose the mangled remains of Brunhilde's bomb. She knelt and examined it. It was not a significant charge. Unshielded, she might have been thrown back against the opposite corridor wall, singed but unhurt. Without her angel's intervention, Rind would have easily formed a barrier around the bomb, containing the blast.

This was not a supplement to training, not a simple device to remind her to be ever alert. This was the punctuation to what had transpired in Brunhilde's office.

Rind turned and sat on her bunk to read the mission brief, convinced that there would be no information about the hitokui that she'd be able to use against it. She was mostly right. The scarcity of information about the beast gave her a clear message: do not engage the creature. Or perhaps worded in a way more true to Brunhilde's intentions: prolong this "mission" for as long as possible.

There was more, limitations placed on her, superfluous details about conduct, even instructions on how to use certain powers in the event of an emergency; all things one would brief a cadet on, or perhaps a goddess with a probationary license. Unofficial punishment indeed. The brief began to frost over.

"Cool mint, Spearmint, be at rest."

As for herself, Rind knew she had no time to reflect or meditate, to direct her anger into venues more appropriate of a valkyrie and goddess. That would have to come later, when the human was safe, and the hitokui miles behind them. "Within twenty-four hours," Brunhilde had said.

She left the hall and raced to Earth.


	3. Meanwhile, on Earth with Marty Stu

On a late June day Eric Paxton found himself a sense of self-preservation and an inexplicable love of life away from drinking himself to death, or perhaps in the spirit of saving money to feed to his car and apartment, even while dead, find a more cost-effective means of suicide.

The image allowed him a bitter smile and a laugh. His friends said he was melodramatic. He admitted to himself that they were right even though they were enthusiastic optimists, able to agree with their jobs, their cars, their love lives. Then there were the acquaintances on the other side of the coin whom either called him a disgrace to pessimists and depressives everywhere or said he was in denial about the true sum of his life, be it good or bad. They too somehow managed to agree with more in their lives than he did.

Eric's smile faltered as he reconsidered his reasons for staying alive and wondered if he really did love life. No, he reminded himself, he didn't necessarily love _his_ life. That was right. He loved the life he wanted, not the one he had. As he walked to the bus stop he went through the mental list once again. Get the car fixed. Pay off the student loans. Get a better job.

And find a new girlfriend. The latest girl he had been dating had said he didn't have enough passion for life and he had not been able to argue. But he was stuck, bound by a need to make money for the things that made it easier for him to be in situations that allowed him to make money. That the irony was not lost on him did not make the breakup any easier.

His phone rang, interrupting dark reverie. No, not his phone, the company's phone; a leash and collar for others, both below and above him, to hold from time to time. Just five minutes before it was his mechanic's turn to give it a yank and pull him back to Earth.

Finally out of work for a day, and on time too, he had been looking forward to a nice quiet walk to the bus stop and a relaxing evening at home knowing he'd not have to pick up his car until Friday when there was time to spare in the late afternoon. But then the mechanic had called and said it'd take a week longer while they ordered a more expensive part, which would, of course, involve more expensive labor. It was fitting news for the middle of the week.

And now, with this new call, more. Someone at work had typed in an order wrong and a mistake had propagated. Only now that the thirty computers were packaged, wrapped, and sitting in the truck did someone discover that they had fitted each with double the hard drive space but half the RAM. The delivery driver was getting impatient (he too just wanted to go home) and hands were short as the majority of the assemblers in the warehouse were on their way home. That left the few the company had shackled with cell phones to come back. Right now that amounted to one assistant manager, Eric, to come in and tell the driver to go home. He had thought assembling computers would be fun.

He turned around, squinting anew as the sun went from reflecting off of the white industrial buildings and windshields to shining in his eyes. A drop of sweat broke from his hairline and rolled into his eye, stinging. To top it off, he remembered that it wasn't quite the end of the week.

"Shit. Tuesday!"

Then another thing, something greater, and more painful than the realization that there were three, not two, days between now and the weekend.

_If only..._

He shook his head once, hard. These were just a fiction: heavenly beings that could make even a call back to work five minutes after leaving it on a Tuesday afternoon in low 90-degree weather with the sun in one's face seem much less... bothersome, a mere quirk of life. An angelic face looking up at him asking if there was anything she could do to help, or telling him his devotion to his chosen line of work was admirable, or...

Again he shook himself. How had he gotten these damned romantic ideas? One minute he had been slogging along, without much purpose, yet not wanting for anything necessary for his survival, and then the next moment, dreams or fantasies of something more, something unreal. Beyond his reach. Worse was that he could almost pinpoint the moment when it started, but not why.

Just after his car had broken down he had made his way to the nearest bus stop of the route that would take him home. On the way a bookstore, a chance to get out of the heat and maybe find something entertaining or relaxing to read. He had followed a routine path through the store, first browsing through the computer magazines for updates on hardware and empty promises to himself to upgrade his own computer after the next paycheck not decimated by his car. Then a halfhearted stroll through the self-help section, turned off by the yellow and black-jacketed books, to 'For Dummies', popular in their condescension. Then science-fiction and fantasy, and finally comics, a joy from his childhood.

With the American comics were manga, which in these days he found more enjoyable than the comics. In the character's exaggerated facial features he could see emotions he could identify with more easily than the visages contorted with rage or sadness he might find in western styles. It was, he thought, a safer indulgence than vivid prose or artwork, and just too fantastic to be pulled into.

There had been a girl there that day. She had stopped him as he had turned to leave, making an observation about Japansese comics that mirrored his own thoughts. More interested in going home than socializing, Eric had lingered anyway. Whether it was because she was attractive or had seemingly read his mind, he could not remember. She had offered to by him an iced coffee, he had agreed, and if the memory wasn't hazy enough, they had talked about something for an hour or two.

Then he had gone home, to a dinner of reheated pizza, a shower, and then bed. He rose the next morning with the same feeling as waking from a very good dream, disappointment. Remembering where he had been the night before he had vowed to himself never to browse the comic section again.

"Maybe I need the Self-Help for Idiots after all," he had said to the mirror. Both confirming and denying his assertion, the sudden mental image of a beautiful face emerging from the mirror with a voice of hope and faith started him on a long day of half-remembered pieces of a fiction he could not be sure he ever read.

The dreams came again.

* * *

Now, days later, he was convinced it had been one of the manga, perhaps one the girl had introduced during their apparently forgettable conversation. He resolved to find it on his way home, when he finally got to go home. The delay would mean little in an already shot day.

The phone rang again. The people at work wanted to know where he was. Eric looked up and saw that he had passed the company building and was heading toward another half a block away as though it were the one he needed to be at.

"I'll be there in a few minutes," he said into the phone before disconnecting. Still he went toward the other building, walking in the street now, almost oblivious to the sound of a car behind him as it approached at, from the sound, an appreciable speed. It pulled up beside him and stopped.

"Get in," a female voice said.

"Huh?" Eric was growing more interested in the other building the closer he got. It seemed to have a heat mirage in front of part of it, on the north corner, near the roofline.

"Eric Paxton, get in the car."

"No. I have to get back to work."

"No. You have to get in the car."

He glanced at the speaker. She seemed to be leaning partway over the passenger seat of the dented sedan, its paint job faded, scratched, and rusted in spots. He took in the unusual color of her hair, blue, the marks on her face, her plain dress: a tank top and khakis, but nothing else before the building took his attention back. As he watched this new fascination the mirage seemed to move down the face of the building, pausing above the ground.

"Get in the car. Now."

Her voice was different now in ways he could not understand. What grabbed his attention was that it now seemed like a good idea to get in the car whereas before he had been anything but interested. He took a sideways step toward it, his eyes still on the mirage, which now seemed to be on the ground, sliding low on the parking lot before the building, slipping around cars. He wanted to see what it was.

"Eric Paxton. Get in this car. Immediately." That indefinable quality was stronger.

Eric found that he wanted to get in the car as much as he wanted to get to the parking lot, no now the street. The mirage was on the road now, coming fast.

He lost all interest in both the car and mirage when something clamped down on his arm and pulled him hard into the car, rapping his head against the frame. Recovering, he had the presence of mind to pull his right leg into the car as it lurched backward. As soon as his foot was in, the woman tapped the breaks and the door's inertia slammed it shut. Then they were racing backward again.

"Put on your seatbelt."

There was no compelling quality this time. There didn't need to be. Eric had no reason to trust the driving skill of a person that went around yanking people off the streets and speeding around in reverse as though it were the only way she knew how to drive. He was buckled in within a second.

"Hold on."

"What?"

The car lurched as the woman put it in a hard right turn. Eric's restraints kept him from being thrown into his abductor's lap. As he reached to his right for something to grab onto to steady himself, he chanced a look out his window, back the way they had come. By the time he spotted the mirage again, they were out of the turn.

The visual distortion was cutting across the corner they had just rounded, where a vacant lot, covered in dead weeds, stood in place of another warehouse. The weeds rustled and parted in the thing's path.

"Um..." he said.

"I know."

He glanced at the woman and saw her concentrating on the road behind them. The glance turned into a stare. Before he had only seen the dots on her forehead. Now he noticed one high on each cheek, below the outside corners of her eyes. As he finally looked away to see if the mirage-thing was any closer he realized that he had seen the woman before.

It was closer. His interest in it fled.

"Turn around," he said "You can't go any faster than this."

"Not here. The road is too rough. We'll abrade the tires and lose too much speed. The surface is smoother on the bridge."

Eric looked behind them. The bridge over the dry wash was half a block away. It was indeed smoother; he had driven over it hundreds of times and always the grinding scratch of tires and gritty asphalt gave way to a low hiss. He swore softly when he saw the opposing traffic.

"It is not in their interests to stay in my way," the woman said.

The constant scratching of gritty asphalt and rubber softened, vanished. Even with a smoother surface he wondered how they could turn without losing speed. Then images from movies came to mind, crazy maneuvers using the emergency brake to turn the vehicle 180 degrees. People had to train for that sort of thing.

"Wait! You've done this before?" His voice came fast, almost panicked. Looking at her again he saw her a smirk play on her lips.

"I have not operated a car before today."

Before Eric could so much as open his mouth in terror, her hand dropped out of sight and something clanked. The car lurched, and he felt himself crushed against his door. Tires squealed and smoked, horns blared, and the world spun in what seemed like hundreds of revolutions. Despite the dangers of being in an out-of-control two-ton mass of metal, what Eric feared the most was not that they'd roll, or that they'd slam into another car, but that he would see that shimmering, that mirage that could part grass before it, lurch out of the dizzying void and onto the hood. Then there was another lurch and they were moving straight, forward now in the direction they'd been heading.

Heart racing from confused terror, he asked, "What is it?" He looked over his shoulder but could not find the shimmer. "_Where_ is it?"

"To the left. It means to attack when we turn to head into the city."

They were nearing the intersection of the road and the highway. A left turn led into Santa Clarita. A right led to Ventura, some forty miles away. The woman pulled into the left lane and started signaling.

"What are you...?"

A glance silenced him. On the verge of condescension it spoke volumes of impatience and something else, something he saw flicker across her deep blue eyes. He had to look away.

She made another sharp turn, though with far less g's than the last. It was to the right, not the left. More horns complained.

"Okay," he said, understanding. "It was watching us."

"Correct." The woman accelerated. Eric watched the needle of the speedometer climb, reach its zenith and fall again as they moved even faster.

"We're going to get pulled over."

"We require a lead of approximately ten miles before it will begin to lose the trail."

"Great... tell that to the cops."

"Law enforcement does not concern me."

"Yeah... maybe if you're just speeding," Eric said. "They take kidnapping a bit more seriously." He looked at her again, tried to glare. He was angry enough. He had enough problems without making them worse by this unscheduled side trip that would last for God knew how long. It wouldn't be a quick trip to the beach; not with the lengths this stranger had gone to get him and take him away.

The phone rang. He fumbled with it getting it out of the clip at his belt. The woman surprised him by taking it from his hand and crushing it as though its casing were cardboard. The feat of strength was lost on him.

"What the hell? That's my phone! Now I can't even begin to—pull over, I have to make a call and see if I still have a job."

"No."

He stared.

"Don't tell me no," he said, low, trying to sound as angry as he felt. "I have responsibility to be there when they call."

"Your responsibility to stay alive supercedes that."

"Yeah, fine. Can't feed myself without a job."

"Starvation is the least of your concerns if you go back." The woman looked as though she too was angry, her impatience transformed.

"What's that supposed to mean?" He looked at the speedometer. His persistence was working, he thought. Their speed was falling.

The woman evidently picked up on his thought and the needle climbed again.

"It would seem it has lost your trail already. Or has left it to feed."

Nonsense. First a kidnapping, then gibberish. Eric raised his voice.

"What? What stopped to feed, huh?"

"Something unfriendly. Something you forget so easily though you saw it with your own eyes."

"A mirage. I saw a mirage!"

The woman glanced at him. "Definitely lost the trail. That was too easy." She said the last with no suspicion in her tone. She said it like it angered her.

Eric shook his head. Nothing about the past ten minutes seemed any more worrisome than two facts. One, he was being kidnapped. Two, he was going to lose his job despite the circumstances. He was sure of it.

"I've had enough. Pull over now."

"I can't do that."

"Fine." Eric reached for the door latch. He was halted by a hand on his arm. One experimental tug was enough to tell him that he might as well be trying to pull his hand free from a chain thick enough to restrain an elephant.

"You are difficult," the woman said. Then she said something else. It made his mind slip away to somewhere dark and quiet. As he descended, he barely had time to realize that what the woman uttered was more of a screech than words, vaguely electronic sounding, a rapid static of tones that he might have found unbearable were it not for the sleep.


	4. The Unscheduled Roadtrip

Back in the bookstore the stranger was handing him a book reminding him to start at the end and work backwards. Well aware this was how one read traditionally structured manga, Eric opens to the middle, defiant. Flipping through the pages at random, images move past, almost coming to life, printed words echoing somewhere. Memories intrude as though he had viewed all of it months before, and more than once. Feelings rise, the disappointment again, and envy. Ridiculous that a two-dimensional character could make him feel that way, but there it was. A wrong number, an errant wish, an ensuing circus of trials for one college student. But throughout _she_ is by his side, supporting him in such a way that no matter how terrible things got, they just aren't all that bad. Somewhere in the middle is a frame filled by her face, gently smiling. This image moves, two-dimensionality fading as her features change from an artistic style to the reality flesh and blood in a way that strikes him as perfectly understandable.

"You're real."

A smile to warm even old, bed-ridden widowers. "Of course I am Eric-san."

Years of unfulfilled goals and visions of what life should be well up and overtake all reason. He remembers that for one person, it only took one wish.

"I wish..."

The smile becomes understanding, patient, sad. "I cannot grant you a wish."

He nods. He knows. "I do not qualify."

No answer. Something seizes his arm. He ignores it.

"Why?"

Still no answer except for the hint of tears in the goddess' eyes. He understands throughout and retreats from the part of him that asked the question. He feels smaller now. The tugging comes again. He knows now who it is that beckons him. He glimpsed her unsmiling face in the pages. She was holding an axe.

"It's ok. I know."

A harder tug. He turns from the goddess to confront another. She stares at him, impatience written on her features. "Let's go," she says. He's awake before he realizes that he's dreaming.

* * *

"Don't you ever do that to me again."

The woman kept her attention on something she was seeing in the side-view mirror.

"How do you address law enforcement personal?"

Eric finally realized that they were not moving. For just a second this worried him, then his anger returned. His hand found the door-latch and pulled. It didn't budge.

"This will end sooner if you answer my question."

More out of spite than any conscious plan to make things go wrong with the highway patrol officer he caught glimpse of in the rearview mirror, Eric said, "Pig. We call them pigs."He felt, rather than saw, the impatient, withering glance. He heard her roll down the window and slumped in his seat, yawning, aware that he was not playing the part of a kidnapping victim. He was thinking of the dream that he knew hadn't been a dream.

"Do you know why I pulled you over?"

"Yes," the woman said. "I was traveling at approximately thirty-two kilometers per hour over the posted speed limit."

Though one corner of his mouth twitched upward, Eric did not move his gaze from where it was set on the road ahead.

"That's great," said the still unseen officer, his tone dry. "Do you realize you were breaking the law and endangering yourself and other drivers?"

"I was in perfect control of the vehicle at all times. The probability of a collision with another—"

"License and registration please."

"I cannot provide these documents."

A moment's silence, then: "Please step out of the car."

Eric sighed. The game had gone on far enough. He decided to give the woman the information she had requested before she put a highway control officer to sleep right there on the road. He glanced to his right, saw the ocean, and corrected himself. They were on the freeway. The Pacific Coast Highway to be precise. He also noticed for the first time that it was near dusk. He rested his head against the headrest and closed his eyes.

"I'm afraid I cannot do that..."

"Officer," Eric added quietly.

"Officer," the woman finished without missing a beat.

He frowned, waiting for something. A command that must be obeyed.

"That wasn't a suggestion, miss. I'll ask you only—"

It came. "Officer, return to your vehicle. Return to the city."

"Tell your dispatcher that you let this one off with a warning," Eric added softly.

"And inform your dispatcher that you let me off with a warning."

Not being on the receiving end of the command, Eric found the voice jarring, though still he could not identify just why the way the woman was speaking now could be so compelling, demanding. He doubted the officer would disobey.

"Yes. Of course," the officer said. "You drive more carefully now."

"I will."

Eric waited for the car to be moving again before he spoke. "Don't do that to me again either."

"Do what?"

"Command me. Tell me what to do. Like you did earlier, and to that cop just now."

She did not look at him. "Should I ask nicely then?"

"You know what I mean," he said. The question, he thought, was whether he himself knew. How she had spoken to both him and the highway patrol officer seemed familiar. The dream he had just had came to mind.

"No. I don't."

"Right. That cop was this close to arresting you. You don't ever tell one 'no' when he asks you to get out of the car."

"I have other priorities."

"Yeah, like kidnapping me." This drew a cold look, but now Eric could see it differently. That undefined thing he had seen in her eyes earlier was still there, and not as fleeting. She still looked impatient and condescending, but now there seemed to be a reason behind it.

When the woman said nothing, he rested his head back against the headrest again and thought ahead. His captor did not appear to have a weapon of any kind, and despite her strength, she could not hold on to him forever. Sooner or later they'd need to stop for gas, and then, if a chance for escape presented itself, he could easily take it. A quick dash to the inside of a service station or convenience store was all he would need. Even if she dragged him out again, the ensuing scene might prompt the clerk to report to the police. Then if their license plate number got recorded by somewhere it would only take a few more stops before someone realized that a this one car kept getting pulled over. Or maybe sooner or later a cop would come by who could resist and the woman would end up putting to sleep right in view of the dashboard cam in his car.

_After all, I resisted_, Eric thought.

That thought brought him back to the present. Then the past.

_How? Yes, there was something... that mirage..._

He replayed the events, but found no reason for a mirage to be relevant; it had been a hot day, mirages were to be expected. And yet this one had been so fascinating that he had resisted the equally inexplicable impulse to climb in to the car when the woman had told him to.

What had followed made less sense. They had fled the scene as if being chased. He could remember being afraid just as he could remember being compelled by both mirage and car, but not why. Only once they had put some distance from the scene could he remember sanity returning to him. He had tried to escape, assuming he truly had it in him to leap from a speeding car. But then the inexplicable popped into his life again. She had put him to sleep.

What followed, the dream, was still a raw mental wound. The manga again, or rather a dream of it, fiction on the surface. Eric tried to get past the memory of the dream, but the more he tried to ignore it, the more it insisted and staying in his conscious mind.

_Why should I fight it? If it's not fiction and she is who she appears..._

The unbidden thought went a long way toward explaining everything that was happening and would give him a genuine reason to trust this woman who had taken him away from his life. But if the images were in fact from something he had once read, then he was now trapped in a car with someone crazy enough to play an exceedingly mad and clever hoax on him, which probably went as far as to have planted what might be a perfectly common graphic novel, or series of them, in his possession and then drugging him so that he was without a clear memory of reading them.

He admitted to himself that both explanations were absurd. A goddess protecting him from a "mirage" or a very thorough conspiracy waged against him. He was not special enough to merit that kind of attention from either.

His heart sank a little then, into bitterness rather than despair. Even extraordinary events left him feeling worthless and mundane.

Helpless, he let the memories run their course, reading a dream from start to finish. At their end he looked at the woman beside him for a long moment. He could place her now, or at least a stylized vision of her, last seen fighting something that looked like a cross between a slug, a lizard, and a lobster.

"What is it?" she asked, her eyes never leaving the road.

"What's your name?"

There, a stiffening in her shoulders, a subtle tightening of her hands on the steering wheel. Eric guessed she was about to lie to him.

"Linda."

Softly, "Bullshit."

"Whether you believe me or not is not my concern."

_Interesting twist to a hoax... lying about who she appears to be, and all but denying that there was anything unique about some of the things she had done._

The hoax theory had worn out its welcome.

"Sure it is. Things would go a lot better if I cooperated."

No response.

"And I'm not going to feel like cooperating if you're not up front with me."

He reached for a name, a nickname. He knew her proper name, but wanted something that he suspected would get a greater reaction from her, something he had _seen_ get a greater reaction from her.

"One winged angel," he said.

The change was immediate, subtle, but he saw every emotion. Anger. Frustration. Confusion. Fear. And maybe something that might evolve into relief if given enough time.

Without warning the woman, the goddess, pressed down onto the break and pulled the car abruptly into a small lot of shop. Eric saw a small restaurant, a tiny general store, and what was nearly a shack selling fishing supplies. However, he believed the important thing was the payphone in front of the restaurant. The woman pulled to a stop right in front of it.

"Stay in the car."

Eric followed her out and stood while she dialed a number he could not follow on the payphone. When she spoke, it was in a language he was certain existed nowhere on earth. Tension flowed through her as she spoke, a tightening of the grip, a stiffening of her posture. At one point she uttered something that sounded akin to the electronic squeal that had somehow put him to sleep, and a moment later her tension peaked into a dreadful stillness. As he watched, the payphone's handset frosted over, and frost began to creep back down its cord. He took a step back, chastising himself for ever thinking this situation a prank and realizing that he was in territory beyond his comprehension. All he knew about the goddess before him was still in the form of drawings in his mind, drawings that gave only a superficial account of what he was seeing. He felt like running away, not from the goddess Rind, but from this total upset of his life that was now well under way.

A sharp plastic sound drew him from his dawning panic. The terse conversation was over. The goddess was facing him now, the payphone behind her looking like any one might find in Minnesota in January, sheathed in a mold of fuzzy ice, drawing stares from passersby.

"Get in the car. We're leaving."

Though she had not used what Eric now remembered was called something like "command speech", he complied at once. He was inside and seatbelted before she was even back in the car. He waited until they were moving again before speaking.

"You know this is going to ruin what little I have of a life."

The goddess said nothing. He watched her face to see if his complaint in any way compounded the frustration and anger he had seen in her face while she was using the phone.

"And it's going to worry a lot of people. My father. My best friend. I was going meet him this weekend."

Still she kept her eyes straight ahead. Eric's gaze flicked to the steering wheel. No sign of frost.

"I'm going to lose my job for sure. My apartment. Probably my car."

"It cannot be helped."

Eric nodded to himself. "Sure. But one thing can. You can tell me what's going on so I can at least know why the life I know is over."

"Indeed." Rind paused as traffic on the Pacific Coast Highway thickened some.

"Approximately three days ago a member of a faction of gods and demons calling themselves the Voice of Earth came into contact with you. My superiors now suspect that this individual planted information in your mind. At this time the nature of this information is no longer unknown, but as for its extent, I will attempt to ascertain this later."

"You're not going in my mind." Apparently a god or demon had already done this, and again Eric had the sensation of being the victim of a cruel hoax, only now one of a different kind.

Before Rind had seemed to relax as she spoke, but now she tensed slightly.

"I am not authorized to do a full read. I am only permitted to learn what I can verbally."

"Right," he said, frowning. Something didn't feel right with what she was telling him. The hoaxed feeling remained.

"This information is relevant to certain plans the Voice have for humankind. A demon by the name of Itzumishita wishes these to fail. Because you are involved in these plans, Itzumishita sent a beast, a hitokui, to destroy you."

"That mirage?"

"That was its cover. Camoflauge. It was calling to you. Appearing in its true from would have likely broken the spell."

"No, that was up to you." He rubbed his head. "It was calling me?"

"Correct. I could not command you at that time."

_So I didn't resist_, he thought. He said something else entirely, something that brought the tension back so fast that he thought for sure the steering wheel, column, and dashboard would be sheathed in ice.

"Calling me like an angel-eater calls angels?"

Rind's words were clipped. "An adequate comparison."

Though there was no ice, Eric moved away from the subject somewhat.

"So why didn't you just kill it? The hitokui?"

"I am not authorized to engage it in battle."

"Why?"

"Unknown."

"You could kill it, right?"

"Yes."

"So somebody told you to come ruin my life when you could just swat this thing."

"The implication was that killing it would lead to a more dangerous situation."

Eric rolled his eyes and came to the conclusion that she was either lying about her ability to kill the hitokui, which he doubted, or the real reason she couldn't was a sensitive issue.

"Why me? No wait. That's unknown too, right?"

"Unknown beyond what I have already stated."

"Great. I don't suppose you know where we're going?"

Again he earned an angered look for the goddess. "North. The hitokui prefers warm climates."

"I hate to break it to you, but this is California in the summer. It's not going to be cold anywhere."

"It will be sufficient. To remain in stealth mode the hitokui must have exposure to at least five hours in temperatures exceeding 82 degrees Fahrenheit. Below this it is visible. Below 65 degrees it is sluggish."

A small voice in the back of his mind told Eric to drop the subject, but the question came out anyway. "So at what temperature does it die?"

"Unknown."

He wasn't so sure. The image of the payphone sheathed in frost came back to him, as did the anger in her tone while she spoke to whomever she had called. He would be surprised if cold didn't kill the thing, and perhaps it was a simple thing for the goddess to freeze the monster solid. All the more insult to injury then to have to protect him from some minor menace.

Eric sighed and looked out his window. He was so beneath her it was no wonder she had been so short with him. But rather than making him feel sympathetic he felt worthless instead, more a burden than something worth saving, and no less angry to have been put in this situation.

Night had fallen by the time they drew near to the outskirts of San Luis Obispo. Bored now with looking out the window at the moonlit landscape, Eric turned to look at Rind. The instrumentation panel of the old car could not illuminate her face.

"We should stop."

"For what purpose?"

"Eric sighed and held up a hand to count off his reasons."

"One, I'm tired of sitting in this car. Two, I have to take a piss. Three, I'm hungry."

He paused while reason number four came to him.

"Four, I'll need a change of clothes and stuff for this little roadtrip of yours. Five... I don't sleep so well sitting up."

"When not actively pursuing you the hitokui can use its energy to track you."

If ever a person could utter a lie and realize she it was a lie in one breath, what Rind said would have sounded just like that.

A bank stood to one side of the freeway. On it's pillar-like sign a digital display showed the temperature.

"Look at that," Eric said. "Three degrees above sluggish. I think you know it won't get near us tonight."

The goddess was silent for a long moment. Eric thought the air in the car was getting colder.

"You are correct. We will stop."

"Great," Eric said. And because he could not resist another quip, "Is there any reason to believe this thing can track me by my credit card?"

"Clarify."

"Uh, if I use it, can it...? Oh never mind." He hadn't thought she'd take him seriously.

"That will not be necessary. I have been provided with the appropriate paper currency to ensure your needs are met."

_How about my need for a normal life?_ His mouth said something else entirely.

"Counterfeit? Do you have any idea how much trouble we'll get into using that?"

"You doubt Heaven's ability to duplicate such a simple thing?"

"Point taken."

"Heaven will pay its debts."

* * *

With Rind looking over his shoulder the entire time Eric could not help but to make his every purchase as though they did not in fact have much time at all. The cash Rind had with her was, at one glance, more than enough to buy three pairs of jeans, a few packages of underwear and socks, several t-shirts, a sweater, toiletries, a tote bag large enough to accommodate it all, and as an afterthought, a towel. Only upon leaving the department store did he realize he could have gotten away with another pair of shoes, a discman, a few CDs, and anything else that might make this unscheduled trip more comfortable. He suspected he'd have plenty of time to make up for it. 


	5. We'll Leave the Light on for You

Back in the bookstore the stranger was handing him a book reminding him to start at the end and work backwards. Well aware this was how one read traditionally structured manga, Eric opens to the middle, defiant. Flipping through the pages at random, images move past, almost coming to life, printed words echoing somewhere. Memories intrude as though he had viewed all of it months before, and more than once. Feelings rise, the disappointment again, and envy. Ridiculous that a two-dimensional character could make him feel that way, but there it was. A wrong number, an errant wish, an ensuing circus of trials for one college student. But throughout _she_ is by his side, supporting him in such a way that no matter how terrible things got, they just aren't all that bad. Somewhere in the middle is a frame filled by her face, gently smiling. This image moves, two-dimensionality fading as her features change from an artistic style to the reality flesh and blood in a way that strikes him as perfectly understandable.

"You're real."

A smile to warm even old, bed-ridden widowers. "Of course I am Eric-san."

Years of unfulfilled goals and visions of what life should be well up and overtake all reason. He remembers that for one person, it only took one wish.

"I wish..."

The smile becomes understanding, patient, sad. "I cannot grant you a wish."

He nods. He knows. "I do not qualify."

No answer. Something seizes his arm. He ignores it.

"Why?"

Still no answer except for the hint of tears in the goddess' eyes. He understands throughout and retreats from the part of him that asked the question. He feels smaller now. The tugging comes again. He knows now who it is that beckons him. He glimpsed her unsmiling face in the pages. She was holding an axe.

"It's ok. I know."

A harder tug. He turns from the goddess to confront another. She stares at him, impatience written on her features. "Let's go," she says. He's awake before he realizes that he's dreaming.

* * *

"Don't you ever do that to me again."

The woman kept her attention on something she was seeing in the side-view mirror.

"How do you address law enforcement personal?"

Eric finally realized that they were not moving. For just a second this worried him, then his anger returned. His hand found the door-latch and pulled. It didn't budge.

"This will end sooner if you answer my question."

More out of spite than any conscious plan to make things go wrong with the highway patrol officer he caught glimpse of in the rearview mirror, Eric said, "Pig. We call them pigs."He felt, rather than saw, the impatient, withering glance. He heard her roll down the window and slumped in his seat, yawning, aware that he was not playing the part of a kidnapping victim. He was thinking of the dream that he knew hadn't been a dream.

"Do you know why I pulled you over?"

"Yes," the woman said. "I was traveling at approximately thirty-two kilometers per hour over the posted speed limit."

Though one corner of his mouth twitched upward, Eric did not move his gaze from where it was set on the road ahead.

"That's great," said the still unseen officer, his tone dry. "Do you realize you were breaking the law and endangering yourself and other drivers?"

"I was in perfect control of the vehicle at all times. The probability of a collision with another—"

"License and registration please."

"I cannot provide these documents."

A moment's silence, then: "Please step out of the car."

Eric sighed. The game had gone on far enough. He decided to give the woman the information she had requested before she put a highway control officer to sleep right there on the road. He glanced to his right, saw the ocean, and corrected himself. They were on the freeway. The Pacific Coast Highway to be precise. He also noticed for the first time that it was near dusk. He rested his head against the headrest and closed his eyes.

"I'm afraid I cannot do that..."

"Officer," Eric added quietly.

"Officer," the woman finished without missing a beat.

He frowned, waiting for something. A command that must be obeyed.

"That wasn't a suggestion, miss. I'll ask you only—"

It came. "Officer, return to your vehicle. Return to the city."

"Tell your dispatcher that you let this one off with a warning," Eric added softly.

"And inform your dispatcher that you let me off with a warning."

Not being on the receiving end of the command, Eric found the voice jarring, though still he could not identify just why the way the woman was speaking now could be so compelling, demanding. He doubted the officer would disobey.

"Yes. Of course," the officer said. "You drive more carefully now."

"I will."

Eric waited for the car to be moving again before he spoke. "Don't do that to me again either."

"Do what?"

"Command me. Tell me what to do. Like you did earlier, and to that cop just now."

She did not look at him. "Should I ask nicely then?"

"You know what I mean," he said. The question, he thought, was whether he himself knew. How she had spoken to both him and the highway patrol officer seemed familiar. The dream he had just had came to mind.

"No. I don't."

"Right. That cop was this close to arresting you. You don't ever tell one 'no' when he asks you to get out of the car."

"I have other priorities."

"Yeah, like kidnapping me." This drew a cold look, but now Eric could see it differently. That undefined thing he had seen in her eyes earlier was still there, and not as fleeting. She still looked impatient and condescending, but now there seemed to be a reason behind it.

When the woman said nothing, he rested his head back against the headrest again and thought ahead. His captor did not appear to have a weapon of any kind, and despite her strength, she could not hold on to him forever. Sooner or later they'd need to stop for gas, and then, if a chance for escape presented itself, he could easily take it. A quick dash to the inside of a service station or convenience store was all he would need. Even if she dragged him out again, the ensuing scene might prompt the clerk to report to the police. Then if their license plate number got recorded by somewhere it would only take a few more stops before someone realized that a this one car kept getting pulled over. Or maybe sooner or later a cop would come by who could resist and the woman would end up putting to sleep right in view of the dashboard cam in his car.

_After all, I resisted_, Eric thought.

That thought brought him back to the present. Then the past.

_How? Yes, there was something... that mirage..._

He replayed the events, but found no reason for a mirage to be relevant; it had been a hot day, mirages were to be expected. And yet this one had been so fascinating that he had resisted the equally inexplicable impulse to climb in to the car when the woman had told him to.

What had followed made less sense. They had fled the scene as if being chased. He could remember being afraid just as he could remember being compelled by both mirage and car, but not why. Only once they had put some distance from the scene could he remember sanity returning to him. He had tried to escape, assuming he truly had it in him to leap from a speeding car. But then the inexplicable popped into his life again. She had put him to sleep.

What followed, the dream, was still a raw mental wound. The manga again, or rather a dream of it, fiction on the surface. Eric tried to get past the memory of the dream, but the more he tried to ignore it, the more it insisted and staying in his conscious mind.

_Why should I fight it? If it's not fiction and she is who she appears..._

The unbidden thought went a long way toward explaining everything that was happening and would give him a genuine reason to trust this woman who had taken him away from his life. But if the images were in fact from something he had once read, then he was now trapped in a car with someone crazy enough to play an exceedingly mad and clever hoax on him, which probably went as far as to have planted what might be a perfectly common graphic novel, or series of them, in his possession and then drugging him so that he was without a clear memory of reading them.

He admitted to himself that both explanations were absurd. A goddess protecting him from a "mirage" or a very thorough conspiracy waged against him. He was not special enough to merit that kind of attention from either.

His heart sank a little then, into bitterness rather than despair. Even extraordinary events left him feeling worthless and mundane.

Helpless, he let the memories run their course, reading a dream from start to finish. At their end he looked at the woman beside him for a long moment. He could place her now, or at least a stylized vision of her, last seen fighting something that looked like a cross between a slug, a lizard, and a lobster.

"What is it?" she asked, her eyes never leaving the road.

"What's your name?"

There, a stiffening in her shoulders, a subtle tightening of her hands on the steering wheel. Eric guessed she was about to lie to him.

"Linda."

Softly, "Bullshit."

"Whether you believe me or not is not my concern."

_Interesting twist to a hoax... lying about who she appears to be, and all but denying that there was anything unique about some of the things she had done._

The hoax theory had worn out its welcome.

"Sure it is. Things would go a lot better if I cooperated."

No response.

"And I'm not going to feel like cooperating if you're not up front with me."

He reached for a name, a nickname. He knew her proper name, but wanted something that he suspected would get a greater reaction from her, something he had _seen_ get a greater reaction from her.

"One winged angel," he said.

The change was immediate, subtle, but he saw every emotion. Anger. Frustration. Confusion. Fear. And maybe something that might evolve into relief if given enough time.

Without warning the woman, the goddess, pressed down onto the break and pulled the car abruptly into a small lot of shop. Eric saw a small restaurant, a tiny general store, and what was nearly a shack selling fishing supplies. However, he believed the important thing was the payphone in front of the restaurant. The woman pulled to a stop right in front of it.

"Stay in the car."

Eric followed her out and stood while she dialed a number he could not follow on the payphone. When she spoke, it was in a language he was certain existed nowhere on earth. Tension flowed through her as she spoke, a tightening of the grip, a stiffening of her posture. At one point she uttered something that sounded akin to the electronic squeal that had somehow put him to sleep, and a moment later her tension peaked into a dreadful stillness. As he watched, the payphone's handset frosted over, and frost began to creep back down its cord. He took a step back, chastising himself for ever thinking this situation a prank and realizing that he was in territory beyond his comprehension. All he knew about the goddess before him was still in the form of drawings in his mind, drawings that gave only a superficial account of what he was seeing. He felt like running away, not from the goddess Rind, but from this total upset of his life that was now well under way.

A sharp plastic sound drew him from his dawning panic. The terse conversation was over. The goddess was facing him now, the payphone behind her looking like any one might find in Minnesota in January, sheathed in a mold of fuzzy ice, drawing stares from passersby.

"Get in the car. We're leaving."

Though she had not used what Eric now remembered was called something like "command speech", he complied at once. He was inside and seatbelted before she was even back in the car. He waited until they were moving again before speaking.

"You know this is going to ruin what little I have of a life."

The goddess said nothing. He watched her face to see if his complaint in any way compounded the frustration and anger he had seen in her face while she was using the phone.

"And it's going to worry a lot of people. My father. My best friend. I was going meet him this weekend."

Still she kept her eyes straight ahead. Eric's gaze flicked to the steering wheel. No sign of frost.

"I'm going to lose my job for sure. My apartment. Probably my car."

"It cannot be helped."

Eric nodded to himself. "Sure. But one thing can. You can tell me what's going on so I can at least know why the life I know is over."

"Indeed." Rind paused as traffic on the Pacific Coast Highway thickened some.

"Approximately three days ago a member of a faction of gods and demons calling themselves the Voice of Earth came into contact with you. My superiors now suspect that this individual planted information in your mind. At this time the nature of this information is no longer unknown, but as for its extent, I will attempt to ascertain this later."

"You're not going in my mind." Apparently a god or demon had already done this, and again Eric had the sensation of being the victim of a cruel hoax, only now one of a different kind.

Before Rind had seemed to relax as she spoke, but now she tensed slightly.

"I am not authorized to do a full read. I am only permitted to learn what I can verbally."

"Right," he said, frowning. Something didn't feel right with what she was telling him. The hoaxed feeling remained.

"This information is relevant to certain plans the Voice have for humankind. A demon by the name of Itzumishita wishes these to fail. Because you are involved in these plans, Itzumishita sent a beast, a hitokui, to destroy you."

"That mirage?"

"That was its cover. Camoflauge. It was calling to you. Appearing in its true from would have likely broken the spell."

"No, that was up to you." He rubbed his head. "It was calling me?"

"Correct. I could not command you at that time."

_So I didn't resist_, he thought. He said something else entirely, something that brought the tension back so fast that he thought for sure the steering wheel, column, and dashboard would be sheathed in ice.

"Calling me like an angel-eater calls angels?"

Rind's words were clipped. "An adequate comparison."

Though there was no ice, Eric moved away from the subject somewhat.

"So why didn't you just kill it? The hitokui?"

"I am not authorized to engage it in battle."

"Why?"

"Unknown."

"You could kill it, right?"

"Yes."

"So somebody told you to come ruin my life when you could just swat this thing."

"The implication was that killing it would lead to a more dangerous situation."

Eric rolled his eyes and came to the conclusion that she was either lying about her ability to kill the hitokui, which he doubted, or the real reason she couldn't was a sensitive issue.

"Why me? No wait. That's unknown too, right?"

"Unknown beyond what I have already stated."

"Great. I don't suppose you know where we're going?"

Again he earned an angered look for the goddess. "North. The hitokui prefers warm climates."

"I hate to break it to you, but this is California in the summer. It's not going to be cold anywhere."

"It will be sufficient. To remain in stealth mode the hitokui must have exposure to at least five hours in temperatures exceeding 82 degrees Fahrenheit. Below this it is visible. Below 65 degrees it is sluggish."

A small voice in the back of his mind told Eric to drop the subject, but the question came out anyway. "So at what temperature does it die?"

"Unknown."

He wasn't so sure. The image of the payphone sheathed in frost came back to him, as did the anger in her tone while she spoke to whomever she had called. He would be surprised if cold didn't kill the thing, and perhaps it was a simple thing for the goddess to freeze the monster solid. All the more insult to injury then to have to protect him from some minor menace.

Eric sighed and looked out his window. He was so beneath her it was no wonder she had been so short with him. But rather than making him feel sympathetic he felt worthless instead, more a burden than something worth saving, and no less angry to have been put in this situation.

Night had fallen by the time they drew near to the outskirts of San Luis Obispo. Bored now with looking out the window at the moonlit landscape, Eric turned to look at Rind. The instrumentation panel of the old car could not illuminate her face.

"We should stop."

"For what purpose?"

"Eric sighed and held up a hand to count off his reasons."

"One, I'm tired of sitting in this car. Two, I have to take a piss. Three, I'm hungry."

He paused while reason number four came to him.

"Four, I'll need a change of clothes and stuff for this little roadtrip of yours. Five... I don't sleep so well sitting up."

"When not actively pursuing you the hitokui can use its energy to track you."

If ever a person could utter a lie and realize she it was a lie in one breath, what Rind said would have sounded just like that.

A bank stood to one side of the freeway. On it's pillar-like sign a digital display showed the temperature.

"Look at that," Eric said. "Three degrees above sluggish. I think you know it won't get near us tonight."

The goddess was silent for a long moment. Eric thought the air in the car was getting colder.

"You are correct. We will stop."

"Great," Eric said. And because he could not resist another quip, "Is there any reason to believe this thing can track me by my credit card?"

"Clarify."

"Uh, if I use it, can it...? Oh never mind." He hadn't thought she'd take him seriously.

"That will not be necessary. I have been provided with the appropriate paper currency to ensure your needs are met."

_How about my need for a normal life?_ His mouth said something else entirely.

"Counterfeit? Do you have any idea how much trouble we'll get into using that?"

"You doubt Heaven's ability to duplicate such a simple thing?"

"Point taken."

"Heaven will pay its debts."


	6. Denial Under a Watchful Eye

With Rind looking over his shoulder the entire time Eric could not help but to make his every purchase as though they did not in fact have much time at all. The cash Rind had with her was, at one glance, more than enough to buy three pairs of jeans, a few packages of underwear and socks, several t-shirts, a sweater, toiletries, a tote bag large enough to accommodate it all, and as an afterthought, a towel. Only upon leaving the department store did he realize he could have gotten away with another pair of shoes, a discman, a few CDs, and anything else that might make this unscheduled trip more comfortable. He suspected he'd have plenty of time to make up for it.

The matter of food was taken care of with greater speed.

"I don't really feel like fast food," Eric had said more to be difficult than any preference. It didn't matter where he ate. His abductor would still be sitting there with him.

"I am not familiar with every dining ritual on this planet. I am afraid I cannot permit your meal to continue for more than one hour."

He had just stared at her, slow to realize she had no idea what the phrase 'fast food' meant.

"What?"

"We will depart from this city at 0400 hours. In order to maximize your opportunity for rest I must limit your—"

"Ok, ok. Just pull into the Carl's over there."

"What?"

"The drive-thru. Where the star with a happy face is."

"The word 'through' is mispelled."

Rind wisely abstained from eating anything that took less than five minutes from order to receipt, and while she drove, Eric ate. It took all of ten seconds for him to decide to let her pick the motel they'd stay in: visions of her droning on about things like tactical advantages, proximity to the freeway, and the like were more than enough to convince him not to express a preference in the matter.

Predictably Rind chose the first motel they came upon. It was the poster-child of seedy establishments, tucked away between the commercial district and the industrial. Eric knew it was the kind of place people went to engage in activities that were not strictly legal or moral, but he held is tongue, curious to see how the goddess would react.

Halfway across the stained carpet of the front office, Rind came to an abrupt stop. Eric had to lurch to the side to avoid running into her. Expecting a manager that was fat, balding, and wearing a tank-top with a myriad of unidentifiable stains, he was surprised to see a well-groomed man that appeared to be in his thirties. His smile was white and seemingly good-natured.

"How can I help you two on this lovely evening?"

"You cannot," Rind said and turned around. Eric blinked and followed her.

"Ok," he said when they were back in the car. "You know I could've told you it was a dive."

"His thoughts were perverse. Unclean. I cannot be certain, but the evidence indicates that that individual engages in video surveillance of the rooms of that motel."

"How do you know?" To him such a suspicion was natural for the type of motel he had known it to be the moment he had laid eyes on it. But his curiosity as to why a goddess would be suspicious treated him to a brief expose on electromagnetic radiation and ultrasonic squeals from cheaply-made crt displays. While bored, Eric was grateful that Rind provided much less detail on what the manager had been exuding in terms of spirit and thought. By that point he was embarrassed enough for not voicing his reservations about the motel sooner.

"Right. So no more places like that."

"Indeed."

* * *

The next place was a loser too, but for less obvious reasons. As pleasant in the front office as the motel looked on the outside, Rind still rejected it after the first question she asked the woman at the desk. 

"I require a telephone in the room," she explained to Eric when they were back in the car again. "I must keep you in sight at all times. Were it necessary to leave the room to use the telephone I would need to wake you."

Despite her words, she did not sound thoughtful.

"A goddess needs a phone to communicate?"

"Other methods are too conspicuous."

It was another avenue of conversation Eric declined to follow.

* * *

The third motel met with Rind's approval despite the noisy bar across the way. Standing behind her he had listened to her brief interrogation of the desk clerk and left the office even more confused than ever by the goddess' standards; the complex did not seem particularly clean, and the clerk seemed as sleazy as Rind had implied the first had been. Yet she pronounced it adequate by producing a narrow stack of bills and asking for a room for the night. 

The room itself contrasted to with outside. It seemed more effort and money was put into keeping them clean than was spent on exterior maintenance. The decor was, of course, as tacky as one would expect of a cheap motel and the in-room TV something out of the 80s. A quick look in the bathroom caused Eric to recoil from the floral print on the shower curtain, a riot of poor art twice as hideous as the designs on the bedspread.

Dropping his bag next to the bed and sitting down, Eric looked up at the goddess. She had been watching him from the moment they came through the door. Granted, it had only been for ten seconds, but his ideas on his level of self worth made it seem longer than that.

"So, uh, who gets the couch?" There was no couch. There wasn't even a soft chair.

"There is no couch."

Eric sighed. "It was a joke. Let me guess, you don't sleep. Or you sleep standing up."

Still facing him, Rind's pose looked every bit as formal and stiff as Eric pictured a military cadet would be when facing her superiors. "I will remain alert until I am permitted a rest period."

"When will that be?"

"Unknown."

"That sucks."

"Clarify."

"You know, idiom. Its not cool that... it's, uh, bad that you can't rest until you're told to."

Rind moved at last, only to stiffen further. "It is my duty. I will not deviate from it."

Eric had the image of someone standing before a colossal blackboard, chalk in hand.

"Terrific," he said. He pivoted, bringing his legs up onto the bed, stretching them out.

"I must bathe. Stay within sight of the door."

Eric waved assent, thinking. The goddess had not smelled of anything, least of all dirt or sweat. Perhaps, he guessed, she was like some people, himself included, that liked to bathe daily, whether or not it was necessary. A more correct explanation hovered at the edges of his consciousness.

Trying to be more interested in the TV than what Rind was doing, Eric picked up the remote from the bed's nightstand and hit the power switch. The flickering, occasionally static-ridden, images did not immediately distract him from the wedge of light shining through between the partly open bathroom door, but after a few minutes a sitcom took hold.

_Not that it would be all that safe to see her naked if she doesn't want that. Oh, hey, this is a funny one._ He turned up the volume, drowning out the sounds of running water coming from the bathroom.

Between moments of amusement he thought about the goddess and the half-open door. Was she modest or just considerate? Or maybe it was, as she said, her duty to watch him always and would have not otherwise deigned to allow a mortal's attention intrude during a moment of privacy.

_Well I just won't look. Probably can't see the tub anyway._

But if he couldn't see her, then how could she see him? Why leave the door open in that case?

The commercial break ended and he plunged back into the TV, absorbed. The sitcom was not that funny after all, but it gave respite from the seriousness of the day. It was almost as though, like alcohol, it took the edge away and made things seem so much less urgent, less immediate.

_No, this drugs me. Not like her._

Her? But he knew. Her face came drifting down into his awareness. If everything he'd been 'shown' were true, and why shouldn't it be, there was a goddess taking a bath ten feet away, then Belldandy would be real too. The other goddesses. The college boy, K-something. In a TV-induced haze he let the images returned to him.

_Yeah, drugs me. But she... softens the world_.

In the images were a talking cat, two personable robots, and angels.

The hair on his neck prickled. Something was watching him. From the bathroom doorway.

Now he was even more afraid to look, not because of what he would see, but because, he discovered then, he still doubted. If he looked he would see, there in the doorway, undeniable proof that Rind and the images that had been plaguing him since that stop at the bookstore, were truth.

Eric rolled onto his side, back to the bathroom, as though something frightful was peering at him from there. He almost wished there were, because the unknown of his own making seemed somehow worse, the unknown he forced upon himself by lingering with doubt.

In the silence between the sitcom and a commercial, he heard that the water had stopped. All at once the feeling of being watched withdrew. He turned down the TV and turned at last when he heard a soft sound behind him. Rind was standing there in the doorway, dressed as she had been before. The only evidence that she had bathed was the steam issuing from the bathroom behind her.

"Are you ill?" she asked.

"What?"

"You're physiological state is distressed."

It wasn't until then that he felt like panicking. He rolled off the bed, stumbled, and shot to his feet. Waiting out a head rush he knelt to his new tote bag, grabbed something at random, and went toward the goddess.

"No, no. Just need... I'm fine. Just need to take a shower. It's been a long day."

He felt like a coward. Afraid of something that would never harm him, that made the world a better place just by its being.

_Wouldn't be _my_ world. I'm just somebody's baggage._

Though Rind stepped aside so he could go through the door, Eric stopped and headed back, never quite aware that he had picked up a package of socks. Guided alone by the suspicion that he'd need most everything in his new tote, he picked it up too and hauled into the bathroom with him.

"Leave the door ajar."

He mumbled something in response.

"With the use of proper techniques a closed door can provide far more resistance than the physical construction provides."

"Ok, ok. Got it." He didn't care if she saw him naked anyway. In fact the image of her avoiding it, curled up on the bed, back to him, as he himself had been positioned moments before, was so ridiculous that it lightened his mood.

The goddess was not in sight when he began to undress.


	7. The Choice to Believe

The shower gave Eric time to think and to come to the conclusion that he could choose to hide from all evidence that would cast aside his last vestiges of doubt, or wait until such things were forced upon him. Whether the latter would be more traumatic he could not tell. Accepting things as they were, and on his own terms, required that he acknowledge the end of his life as he knew it, a fearful proposition in any case.

He had washed his hair for the third time before he realized he was stalling. It was as though the decision had been made for him, and that he was only waiting for when he had to surrender to circumstances. After washing the last of the shampoo away he forced himself to turn off the water.

* * *

He found Rind seated on the floor with her back to the wall the room shared with the bathroom and her knees drawn to her chest. She was hunched over, arms folded, head resting on them as though asleep.

"Uh, Rind?" The idea that she was taking a nap seemed so antithetical to all that he knew about her so far that he had not softened his voice at all.

"Yes?"

Carrying his bag back out again, Eric set it down where he had placed it earlier.

"So, uh..." Revealing what he knew, whether by intuition or because some deity had 'shown' him, made him nervous. Past experience told him Rind would be annoyed at best.

"... Who... which one was watching me earlier, when you were bathing?"

"Cool Mint." No anger this time.

The name didn't help. "They're, uh, twins, right?"

Rind looked up. "In a manner of speaking, yes." She stood and faced him. "Perhaps now we should discuss what the Voice of Earth's neophyte revealed to you."

"I don't know all of it. It comes and goes like... memories of a dream."

Rind just looked at him. Assuming she didn't understand, Eric struggled for an analogy. "Like driving down a street. Sometimes you see the hills in the breaks between buildings, and sometimes you don't."

"Reveal what is available to you." It sounded more like a poorly worded request than a command.

"Ok, but first I'd like to ask you something."

"What is it?"

Feeling shy and without any kind of meaningful self control, he babbled. "Well, so many things have happened and it's hard to take it all in. Sure this 'neophyte' put things in my head but it doesn't make it all real. I mean, seeing those hills between the buildings isn't the same as walking on them, you know? You can image what it's like, but when you get there it's totally different, like—"

"Cool Mint, come forth."

Eric flinched as though struck. Even when the angel appeared and the spectral flurry of activity surrounding her emergence had subsided, he was still without breath. She hovered a foot before his face, her one wing, behind her right shoulder, was motionless, and her blonde hair, defiant of gravity, looked windswept. She was naked save for a thin, flanged piece of fabric covering her chest, and coils of a similar substance surrounding her like a cocoon from the hips down.

Her blue eyes, inquisitive and expectant, held him. There was nothing in them he could fear or react against, no potential or deception or malice. The power of her gaze was like that of someone able to see through him, but Eric found that in the openness of the angel's gaze and expression, the reverse was true. Her eyes allowed him to see through her.

He realized he had extended his hand.

"Um. Hello. Nice to meet you."

Cool Mint looked at it, smiled gently, and took it. Her grip was soft, warm, and solid. Like flesh and blood.

"I guess you already know my name," Eric said.

She nodded.

"Didn't mean to be so weird earlier."

Cool Mint's eyebrows rose.

"I mean, when... I guess she had you watch me because she couldn't see me from the tub. I was kind of scared to look because of what it would mean. It's not that a lot of weird things haven't happened already, but a person can always kind of ignore some of it and explain a lot of it away, and then before you know it you think a goddess is just some ordinary person."

He knew he was babbling but felt powerless to stop. But following his apology he could feel a desire to sit down and tell his life story to this angel, and while doing so with a human being would make that life story short and uneventful, telling it to Cool Mint made him want to treat every detail with equal importance. The hard part was the feeling that if Rind permitted it, Cool Mint would listen to every word.

"Anyway, I want to say it was nothing against you. I guess I just have problems facing up to reality."

It was news to him, but when Cool Mint inclined her head and her expression softened, Eric forgot all about it.

"I uh, I guess I should talk to Rind now."

A smile, a nod, and the angel disappeared in a near silent vortex of the ribbon that had been covering her hips and legs.

Her influence lingered. Eric had to sit down.

"How did you know?" he managed.

"To which information are you referring?" Rind asked.

"That I wanted to see her."

"Your earlier skepticism was indication enough that you would have difficulty accepting the additional circumstances of the company of a goddess. I understood that Cool Mint's surveillance of you would not go unnoticed, and that you would be faced with a choice to continue with denial or without it."

"All right, I get it. You had a hunch."

"I had more information than the word 'hunch' implies."

The warmth of Cool Mint's presence had faded. Now there was just Rind. Eric no longer felt like long discussions when a word such as 'hunch' was explanation enough.

"Ok then. You wanted to know what that, uh, neophyte told me. Showed me. Right?"

"Yes."

"Right. Ok. So I know there's a guy in Japan, a college student. I think his name starts with a K. I think what I remember is in chronological order. He was having kind of a bad day and was in his dorm calling somebody. He dialed the wrong number and got, uh..."

He uttered a short, uncertain laugh. Despite what he had seen already, giving voice to these memories was still an awkward experience.

"An agency of some kind in Heaven. Uh, the heavens, or whatever you call it. Apparently this agency is for helping people in need, so they sent down a goddess to grant him a wish. Belldandy. The guy wished for someone like her to be with him forever. And, well, I guess there is no one like Belldandy but herself."

* * *

Te rest of the story flowed easier, though the occasional hole in his memory caused Eric to provide tentative explanations of his own as to what might have happened during the gaps. He told Rind everything he knew and in all the detail he had available. The only thing he did not give fair treatment to was the part of his false memories that involved her. He knew the ice on the payphone had been in response to what she had heard from the person on the other end, but he could easily imagine part of her anger having been in part due to his calling her 'one-winged angel'. He meant to avoid a repeat of that by touching on events during which that name had been uttered.

There was no immediate response to his recollections.

"So is it true? What I said?"

Rind nodded. "Outside of your speculations, and to the best of my knowledge, yes."

"So why did this girl show me all of that?"

"Unknown."

"Because it really messes things up for me. I mean, not only do I have some monster after me, I have this knowledge, no, dream of a goddess whose very smile just... makes things better. I... I can't put words to it."

"The hitokui is not a cause for concern," Rind said.

"Which brings me to why the hell you're protecting me from the fucking thing. It seems to me you're pretty pissed off about something, and I've been getting the feeling that I'm just some insect somebody finds valuable and so you got stuck with having to babysit me."

He was not exactly satisfied to see the subtle change in her expression. But it did make him feel that he was right to suspect circumstances as opposed to personality as an explanation of her behavior.

"So yeah, you could kill it without breaking a sweat. Hell, maybe even I could kill it by throwing ice cubes at it. But I figure somebody up top told you not to do that and made up some shit excuse as to why. All part of the way things are done right? It's like where I work. Worked. There's all this procedure that messes things up more often than it keeps mistakes from happening. Like today, somebody in customer service couldn't understand some manager's new order form and made a big mistake, and so somebody assembled some computers with—"

Rind had turned away and the rest of Eric's rant died on his lips.

"Sorry."

"Do not apologize for faults not your own," Rind said, still not looking at him. Eric thought he heard a change in her voice. Conciliatory? Forgiving? Sympathizing? None seemed to fit. He wanted to know more.

"We're going to be around each other for a while, aren't we?"

"That is a possibility."

"So maybe you can tell me a little more about what is going on, so, you know, I don't go making any wrong assumptions."

"I have limitations as to what I may reveal to you."

Eric sighed. "Of course. 'Need to know' and crap like that, right? But what _can_ you tell me? Why'd they stick you with such a simple mission?" He reached for and caught a fragment of memory that was not his. "You fought with that girl. She was really powerful, and it was just a piece of her there. She was somebody's mother, the rest of her was... and there was that monster." Another memory, this time it was his, of what he'd touched on earlier in the car when Rind had first told him of the hitokui. "That angel eater. Lot's of things to fight, and you weren't all that winded at the end, were you."

Despite his intention to avoid this particular narrative, he was in it anyway.

"I know you're no lightweight. Not some grunt who has to earn respect. You—"

"Enough. This is not a topic I wish to discuss."

Far more than a reference to what she was allowed to say, the expression of her own desires made him want to abandon the subject. He found that he actually wanted to bond, but not by forcing sensitive issues.

"Ok. So now what?"

"You should get your rest. It is best we remain in motion, and I agree that it is best that you sleep here, now, in a bed."

"I don't think I can sleep right now." His mind wanted to race, and he new that the moment he closed his eyes, it would break free from his control and deny him any peace. The mental suggestion of going to the bar for a drink to slow him down came and went. From what he had seen of the bar it was seedy enough to attract the kind of people that made mean drunks who didn't take no for an answer. The carnage that would ensue should one of them decide he wanted to take Rind home with him would not make for a relaxing evening at all.

"It is not something I can help."

"Yes you can."

Rind looked at him again. "It was your express desire that I do not."

Eric tried a smile. "Well maybe I was a little hasty. Go ahead."

This time he didn't even hear the screech.


	8. Bad News From the Mirror

The dream was an ordinary one until a goddess stepped out of mirror, the presence of which was suitably beyond the logic of this particular dream that Eric at once realized he was in a dream. Yet this lucidity made him no less anxious to see the dream image of Belldandy. He wanted to start opening up to her as he had been tempted to do with Cool Mint, but foremost there was a question on his mind. Though this was the only second time he had 'met' her while asleep, the goddess seemed so vivid and real that it felt like he had a long history of such dreams.

"Why do I keep dreaming of you?"

While awake Eric was prone to passing dreams off as wish fulfillment or dialogues with aspects of oneself cloaked in familiar imagery. This was why he was surprised when the goddess opened her mouth to answer.

Though yearning to hear her speak the dream world turned gray. Seeing this, the image of Belldandy said something else, the sound of her voice lost but the motion of her lips clear.

"Another time."

* * *

Eric rolled out of the bed, cursing under his breath, again plagued by the feeling of being pulled away from something dear. And the apparent cause of his waking seemed worthy of scorn. He had to pee. 

It wasn't until he was finished did he notice what was wrong. First he could see that the red numerals on the digital clock on the nightstand indicated it was 4:30. Rind had said they would leave at four. As for the goddess herself, she was seated before the door motionless, and the detail Eric was astonished to have missed when he first woke, both angels were out, both as motionless as Rind.

She had told him she would not sleep. He took a few steps toward her, halting when a light behind him projected his shadow on the goddess. Turning he saw the light coming from the bathroom. From his angle he could see that it originated at a point somewhere above the sink, where the mirror was.

"Can't be."

He rushed to the doorway and looked in time to see a figure finish emerging from the reflecting surface. It was not Belldandy. It took Eric only a second to recognize the girl from the bookstore. He opened his mouth to express his sudden outrage at her appearance and the upset to his life that she had initiated. No sounds came, of course. There was too much to say.

"The name is Atla."

"You..."

"Again, Atla. And don't look so happy to see me."

She shouldered past him, moving from the now dark bathroom to bedroom, lit by light from streetlamps come from around the edges of the room's curtains. He followed. He could see little of her except for her dark hair and flowing attire.

"Would it have pained Brunhilde to have sent a little backup?" Atla said, almost in a whisper. She looked at Eric as though there could be no bad blood between them as far as she was concerned. "That's one exhausted valkyrie. I'm told she hasn't slept for weeks. It's like—"

There was a soft impact behind and to Eric's left an instant after both Rind and Atla disappeared from view.

"The Voice of Earth's representative?" Rind asked. She was right there, pinning Atla to the wall with one hand against her chest.

"Well I wasn't, until after my little, shall we call it, indiscretion? Give a mortal a little heads up and... You know, even splinter groups get bogged down in bureaucracy."

"Answer the question."

"Well I get to drop in from time to time and lend a hand where it's needed. Contribute to his welfare and such."

Eric glared. "What? I'm not feeling particularly benefited by your last contribution to my welfare."

"Well considering your company I'm not surprised," Atla said.

Eric watched for a reaction from Rind but saw none.

"It's not the company that's the problem, and you know it."

Atla appeared surprised. "What better way is there of being introduced to worlds beyond than visions of one of the most widely respected goddesses in Heaven _and_ Hell?"

"Yeah. _Visions._"

"Well forgive me if my attempts at charity aren't up to your liking. It's my old life seeping through. I wasn't raised to be tactful. Be thankful I didn't just dump you on the temple grounds."

Eric turned away and sat on the bed rubbing his temples.

"Well at least then I wouldn't have a monster after me?"

Atla giggled. "What, the hitokui? That had to be Izumishita's idea of a joke. It's probably dead in a ditch by now. He just sent that thing to stir things up."

"What does that accomplish?" Rind asked. "If it is such a trivial effort."

"Oh there's no mistake it would have eaten him, but if Izumishita really meant for that goal to go off without a hitch then our boy would be dead by more certain means, which brings me to the reason for my visit. Really, it is actually urgent."

"My hall will contact me with urgent matters."

Atla rolled her eyes. "Oh yes, because Brunhilde respects you so. Why, this mission must be a thinly veiled vacation! A duty-crazed valkyrie knows no other kind after all."

Though neither Rind's expression nor posture changed, Eric could imagine how deep the remark cut.

"Why don't you just leave," he said. "You're not doing us any favors."

"I will if I have my say."

"Then have your say and be gone," Rind said.

"No doubt you've heard of the Ginnungagap."

Now there was a change. Rind's body seemed to tense, solidify, like the goddess' substance had turned into lead.

"It would not be in the best interests of Hell to release that creature."

"I agree, but not all in Hell have its best interests at heart."

"Izumishita."

"Bingo. I'm sure you'll be hearing from your hall shortly. Although it would seem they do not wish you as much forewarning as I."

Rind backed away from Atla and looked at the telephone. It too sat on the nightstand, next to the clock. The time now was 4:40. To Eric, too much time had passed.

"What do we do?" he asked.

"No doubt wait for reinforcements. This beast is too much for one Valkyrie."

"Leave," Rind said. "Or I will seal you."

Atla held up her hands. "I'm as good as gone. Trust me, I don't want to be around if that thing shows up in this city. I'd rather not hear the screams."

Eric looked at the door, expecting the sounds of anguish to come drifting through from across some distance. Atla brushed passed him, brushing her shoulder against his.

"Don't worry yourself about it. I don't think Brunhilde will stoop so low as to let Rind face this alone." And with that she was back inside the bathroom, passing through the mirror.

"Rind?"

"She was lying, trying to test my—"

The phone rang.

Both looked at it as though such devices brought only bad news. Since Eric was closer, he picked it up.

"Uh, hello?"

There was as stunned silence on the other end. Then:

"This is Brunhilde. I wish to speak with Rind immediately."

It occurred to Eric to use this opportunity to give the goddess on the other end a piece of his mind for whatever she had done by giving Rind a mission so un-challenging as to be little more than an insult. In the same breath it also occurred to him that Brunhilde would not tolerate rebuke from a mortal and would just put him to sleep over the phone. Then there was the detail of what Atla had said. If she had not been lying, then this was no time to be self-righteous. He handed the phone to Rind.

"It's Brunhilde."

Rind tensed as she reached for the phone, whether in anticipation of bad news or further insult he was not sure.

"Yes?"

She was silent for the next minute. Unreadable.

"Understood." She put the phone back on the cradle.

"We must leave now. Grab your belongings."

Eric did as he was told, tossing his shoes into his tote, zipping it shut, and picking it up in his left hand. He almost flinched when Rind grabbed his right. She pulled it over her shoulder and wrapped her free arm around his waist.

"What're you doing?"

"It is best if you close your eyes and hold your breath."

"Why?"

She hauled him into the bathroom. "This will be very disorienting to you. Do as I say."

Eric swallowed and closed his eyes when the mirror began to glow.

The next thing he felt was a sort of weightlessness, perhaps not what an astronaut would feel in the absence of gravity, but perhaps what one would feel if suspended by every atom in his body. Next came the mirror.

There was no pain or noticeable change in temperature. There was just a feeling of a thin membrane passing through his just as he passed through it, a temporary juxtaposition of existence, or a feeling of density that swept from his head to his feet. Once it was past he tried to breath.

At first he exhaled, and the breath flowed from him with a bit more force than he was comfortable with. Inhaling proved difficult, and he could not tell if he drew air. With that breath his lungs were not satisfied, and a second did nothing to remedy the situation. Nearing panic he reached out for Rind to get her attention but could not find her. He could still feel her arm around his waist and her hand on his, but his reaching hand could not reach her.

Then it was over. Air rushed back into him and a solid surface bumped against his bare toes.

"Put your feet on the ground."

His eyes still closed, Eric bent his legs, flexed his feet and gingerly pushed downward. The moment he felt dirt and gravel on the soles of his feet his weight returned. Only then did he risk opening his eyes.

Wherever they were, it was dusk. They stood before a still pond, the night sky reflected in its surface. To the left was a gentle slope leading up to a mountain.

"Where are we?"

At first Rind did not answer. She was looking at a point downslope, scanning the area with her eyes.

"Japan. Nagano Prefecture."

"Are we…" It was a hard question to ask. As much as he wanted to meet Belldandy he felt too unworthy to be in her presence. On top of that there might be a day when he would have to leave, which he believed would feel the same as waking from a good dream to the awareness that he must go to work.

"Are we going to see them?"

"No valkyrie can be spared. I was ordered to bring you there and obtain their support. Fortunately we were intercepted."

"Fortunately?"

Rind glanced at him. "I was chastised for endangering the goddesses on a prior mission. If I could choose, I would not do that again."

Eric nodded, understanding. Apparently it was less of a problem to put others in danger when your superiors told you to do it.

"Intercepted by what?"

Rind was still looking downslope, and as Eric watched, her expression hardened.

"Run." She half turned and pointed upslope. "When you see the road to your left, go down to it. It will lead you to a tunnel. Go as far in as you can without passing halfway."

Instead of running, Eric rooted himself to the spot. He thought he saw now what Rind had seen. A visual disturbance was forming near a grove of trees a building that appeared abandoned. As he watched, it grew.

"Run. Now!."

For his stubbornness Eric expected the command speech. But there was none. Taking just one step backward he watched as Rind's angels appeared. Cool Mint, on Rind's right, turned and looked at him. To say her expression was beseeching would be the same as saying the ocean is wet. That alone would have made him just want to hug her. It was the fear he saw there as well that made him turn and run.

Though it was he that tripped and fell, striking his knee on a rock, he called back, "Be careful!"

"Do not look back under any circumstances!"

Which prompted him to look back, only to see Rind flying down the hillside towards the disturbance, which now seemed to be taking shape. It was till too early to see what it was. Eric wasn't sure he wanted to.


	9. Telling a Human Not to Look?

_I was so close, Keiichi. I'm sorry._

Changing into her battle dress she continued, understanding now that this was no longer an ersatz vacation, not by any stretch of the imagination. Her orders left no room for interpretation now that the great beast had prevented her from reaching the temple. Despite the irresponsibility of recruiting the other goddesses in holding off the Ginnungagap, in a populated area no less, there still might have been a chance to seal it temporarily until its handlers could be summoned or a wing of the Valkyries could be gathered to dispatch it. But now, watching it draw itself into the world, she lost confidence. She knew this was in part to it's the horror in its face, but part was also due to the certainty that she would die, and that when the beast was through with her, it would go after Eric. At that point she would fail in her mission.

She stopped short, reassessing her priorities. Her present orders or her overall mission. Was this a test from Brunhilde? An extension of the insult? The orders themselves did not explicitly nullify the rest of the mission. She was still to protect the mortal from harm, so now she had to disobey to remain dutiful.

It was too late to pull back. The Ginnungagap attacked.

* * *

The hill mocked him, reminding him of his failure to develop an exercise regimen every time he had decided to start one. He had been too impatient, of course, or focused on the wrong goals, and now he felt the cost of it, his lungs hurting and legs throbbing. Somehow the pain of his effort even reached his teeth. Yet he could not stop. Rind had told him to run and he was determined to do it until she said to stop. And if she could not come back to tell him to stop… 

_No! She'll get back! _

A distant crackling hiss sounded from somewhere down the hillside. Below it was a low drone.

_Why was Cool Mint so afraid?_

Perhaps it was because he was so focused on remaining in motion that a fragment of memory, an impression, broke free. It was another hill glimpsed between buildings. It had to do with angels, and their relationship to their host goddesses. It was not so much an image he saw, or a carefully placed word bubble where Atla might have thought a picture would not suffice. It was just an idea, but a powerful one.

It was why Eric stopped running. He knew it hadn't been Cool Mint's concern he had seen. Maybe it had been amplified through her, cleaned up, freed from pretense and discipline, but it hadn't been just her fear. He was as sure of that as he was sure Rind wasn't coming back, and as sure that the creature would end up catching him when it had at last killed Rind.

No sooner had he stopped and leaned against a tree to catch his breath did a bright mass streak overhead and slam into the hillside at a point that looked no more than a quarter of a mile away. It had not looked like an errant attack. It looked thrown. And it was still moving. Having impacted a relatively steep area, kicking up a cloud of dirt, it was now tumbling down, seemingly falling to pieces as it went, breaking in two. Running again Eric drew close enough to see more fragments coming away and drifting in the air after escaping the wake of the projectile. The came down in lazy zigzagging arcs, like leaves. Or feathers.

Now afraid beyond his ability to understand, Eric could move no faster. Between and throughout each desperate breath he heard himself uttering the same word over and over, and endless stream of insistent denial.

"Nononononono…"

He at last reached Rind and crashed to his knees.

"Shit. Oh shit."

The goddess looked terrible, her uniform tattered, bruises visible everywhere. That she was a goddess made things look worse than they would on a human. What cemented his conviction that she was seriously hurt was what lay near her. An angel with half a wing, blackened at the edges. They were not connected. Eric crawled over to the still form and saw that it was Cool Mint.

_This is wrong. Bad, very bad. They shouldn't be apart. No. Not at all._

With only a second of hesitation he took the angel by the shoulders, falling on his butt when he overestimated her weight. Unconcerned about moving the injured who had just been hurled against a mountain, he pulled Cool Mint over and set her aside Rind. When nothing happened he looked for the end of her and, vaguely surprised to find that she had feet, took hold of her legs and maneuvered her and Rind around so that her feet were on the goddess' back. Again, nothing.

"Come on. _People_ die from that. Not you. Not you!"

Yet he couldn't be sure they were alive. Leaning close he listened for Rind's breath unsure if a goddess even breathed. There was something, maybe, or just wishful thinking. Trying for a pulse yielded more promising results, faint, but certainly not his own. His heart was beating to quickly to account for what he felt in the goddess' neck.

Cool Mint's condition was harder to assess. And now there was no time. Without needing to look Eric knew something loomed behind him.

_What could I have done anyway?_

In a split second night was day, overwhelming, and loud. The world was washed out in blue-white light followed by an instant green afterimage, blinding Eric about as much as the thunder following the light deafened him. In the windstorm that followed it happened again and something shrieked behind and above him. And then twice more. With each blast, smaller than the first, he could begin to sense a direction. It was to the right, and whatever it was it seemed to be attacking the beast. The air grew still again.

With no temptation to look behind him at the monster he looked to the side instead. A woman moved toward him, nearer than he thought, her pace unhurried.

She was tall, clad in a deep red and black gown trimmed in gold that had a 'neckline' that plunged down past her navel long adornments that hung from each shoulder. Equally revealing was the slit up the front, revealing half of her inner thighs with each step. Wide bracelets adorned each wrist, and other ornaments were attached to her white hair, holding it up. There was a six-pointed star on her forehead and five-pointed ones on each cheek. She was striking, and the inappropriateness of Eric's response was not lost on him.

"Well which is more pathetic," she said, her tone almost soothing. "That a Valkyrie lies wounded and unconscious, protected by the mortal she was to protect, or that she was made to protect him in the first place?"

She came around Rind and stopped on the other side of Cool Mint from Eric. It occurred to him to ask who she was, but part of him already knew. That part was not being very forthcoming, however.

"This may be where you bow before me and thank me for saving your life."

"Help us. Please."

The woman rolled her eyes. "I just did."

"Are you with the Voice of Earth too?"

She giggled and looked offended at the same time.

"Hardly. I am the Daimakaicho, Hild. And you are at my service."

While she was speaking Eric got a good look into her eyes. He immediately wished he hadn't. Whatever he glimpsed there he couldn't define, but that nameless thing frightened him on the power of principle alone.

"Don't tell me that meddling ex-demon didn't tell you who _I_ was."

Eric thought she meant Atla. "I don't want to remember." His eyes flicked downward at the angel, conscious of the fact that nothing was being done about her condition.

"Hmm? Oh this?" Hild nudged Cool Mint with her foot. "She'll die soon outside her host like this. It's a pity, really. There are none that can _really_ support two. Sooner or later one's strength runs out. Or is taken."

"Can you help or not?"

"Oh really, you _are_ a bother!" Hild said raising one hand to the sky.

Cringing, Eric realized her gaze was not on him but something behind him. Forcing himself not to turn he covered his ears as for all appearances a bolt of lighting struck Hild's upraised hand and then arced over his head. There was another resounding shriek from the still unseen beast before quiet was restored.

Lowering his hands, Eric looked up at her, expectant.

Hild sighed at him. "Really now! Assuming for a moment that I _wanted_ to help, what makes you think I can?"

"Well... You're... I don't know."

She crossed her arms and leaned toward him. "There's a good reason that angel is lying there. Have you thought about that?"

Eric waited for her to continue. Hild, in turn, waited for him to say something.

"Oh for...! You're slower than Keiichi!" She lifted into the air a few feet and appeared to sit, reclining some. "She can't host two angels now. And with the hit she just took it would seem she could not keep the angel from being knocked free."

"We can't just—"

"We?"

"Well... can't... can't you host her?" It was the longest shot, and his intuition told him the suggestion was absurd.

Hild laughed, and glared. "Really it would be less cruel just to let her die. My soul would turn her faster than Belldandy's turned that devil."

A thick snap sounded in the back of his mind where chains of denial still held some information back. The knowledge welled up, settling like lead in his stomach. He knew who Hild was now. He knew what she had done.

"Dai...ma...kaicho Hild..." His voice was in a whisper.

Hild clapped her hands together! "Oh so you _have_ heard of me!" The she dropped the act. "You grow dimmer by the minute. You're not worth my time." And then, as though Eric had somehow kept her there against her will her expression turned hard.

Trying not to look into Hild's eyes, Eric slowly positioned his body over Rind. Perhaps Cool Mint was lost, but the goddess was not.

Hild's eyes widened, more in cold mirth than surprise. "Oh and if I do decide to attack? What will you do then?"

Because he knew the answer was nothing, and because at that point he thought there was nothing he could say to appease her, he said, "Beg?"

In stages the Daimakaicho's features softened. "How chivalrous, demeaning yourself for a woman." Her gaze flickered to behind him for an instant before she slow rolled in the air and drifted down hover with her face inches from his.

With growing humiliation, Eric pulled back as far as he could, which was not very far at all.

"I think I've changed my mind. I like you after all, which is why I'm going to give you a few helpful hints."

"O... ok."

"Shut up. Now, one, the fact that the Ginnungagap is here is nothing personal. Someone down in hell knows if it were ever released on Earth that I'm about the only one who could deal with it. That someone thinks my attention can't be divided. Fool."

She drifted closer, her mouth near his cheek.

"Second, the Valkyrie will live. And so will the angel if you can find a suitable host. But seeing as the nearest one is about a 100 miles to the southeast, there's not much you can do."

Now her lips were near his ear, almost touching. Her bangs brushed against his forehead as she moved. Eric trembled.

"Third, don't look at itor you will know pain."

Then she was moving, up and away, turning to face the still quiet beast.

"Now somebody's been a bad dog, running away from home!"

Still not out of his line of sight, Eric could see electricity, or something like it, gathering around her arms. Hild noticed his attention and called down to him.

"Save your gratitude for the next time we meet."

Then she was looking away, moving out of sight. And it took every ounce of will not to turn and watch. As he turned his eyes back down to Rind and her severed angel he heard Hild call out behind him.

"Shame!"

Crackling and bellowing filled the air but he tuned it out. Focusing on Cool Mint he muttered to himself.

"A suitable host. Suitable host. What's suitable?"

The Earth trembled and the bellowing form the monster grew louder.

_Don't look._

Always good advice, given to him by two deities no less—doubly hard to follow.

A fissure appeared ten feet to the right. Dim red light shone from it as though there were magma far below. Watching it, the light turned blue. Following the fissure back toward its source, the light was brighter, turning to white.

_Don't look!_

It was his mental voice, not echoes of Rind or Hild. But since when did he listen to the wiser instruction of his mind?

He saw the hole, a bright wound in the Earth, lightening flickering at some point above it. But no beast. He angled his head up and saw Hild, a cage of lightning, a large conical shape the size of a building. As he watched, the shape tilted forward and grew opaque.

_DON'T LOOK!_

Two sulfur-yellow clouds billowed into sight above a toothless maw. Entranced, Eric watched as the clouds began to clear revealing voids beyond.

The world went silent but there was still much to see. The monster becoming more visible, the lightning dancing silently, and Hild, turning away when confronted with the monster's face, her eyes first narrowed in disgust but then widening when she saw Eric looking up.

Eric felt himself drawn away until he was in a barren place, littered with jagged rocks and things, wood or bone maybe, somehow bleached by a light that was harsh and dim at the same time. There were light-years of emptiness in every direction. Somewhere, in another body, his body shook, his chest heaved, his head and neck vibrated, tears streamed. A burning breath later it happened again, and again, stomach cramping with effort to sustain the screams.

Hope dropped away while he stood helpless in the expanse. Loneliness engulfed. Still looking up he thought he saw Hild, the cold gaze he remembered now warm, passionate, and caring when compared against the void. He reached for the image of her, yearning for her company in the void, her condescension and sharp tongue forgotten, her warmth breath against his ear as she tried to prevent this suffering remembered.

In the other body his throat now burned with his stomach. Without warningitcame to meet him, or he to meet it, he could not tell which. Then he was whole again and the agony was more real, focused, and he doubled over in the dark, blind.


	10. A Little Extra Weight to Carry

Even Hild found the Ginnungagap's gaze disquieting, so when it opened its eyes she turned away, perfectly able to send it home without watching. But as she turned it occurred to her that the beast had not opened its eyes to look at her. Such impudence would earn it great punishment—attempting to cow the Daimakaicho! No, it was looking at someone that had chosen to look at it and be cast into a void. She saw the mortal looking back, frozen, screaming and realized her mistake had been in warning him not to look.

Humans and their endless curiosity. It made them stupid. Even the most powerful of them just had to learn just a little more, see just a little farther, until, like all desires, their quest for knowledge overwhelmed reason and got them into trouble. For this Eric Paxton, relatively weak as his kind went, the trouble was great indeed. She watched him come apart and reconsidered her sudden fondness for him.

"Shit."

He was reaching up to her as though she was the embodiment of salvation. This would not do.

Even if he only ever served to amuse her by getting caught up in one of her schemes against the goddesses, she had no wish to witness what was happening to him to its very end. In fact, she realized, she wished to see it stop.

She cast a simple spell down onto him, blinding him, but not for long. He'd need his sight again soon to finish pulling himself from whatever dark place he was in.

Turning back to face the Ginnungagap she pulled one bracelet from her left wrist.

"Playtime is over. I'm sending you home right now. This may kill you a bit."

* * *

In the dark, orbiting something even darker. Eric was buffeted by a din from outside him then bounced by a quake. Then it all ended, and the silence crushed him. Behind it distant echoes sulked back from whatever mountain they came up against.

The void within receded somewhat, folded in on itself, trying to pull him with it. It was torture to resist, a wrenching in his emotional core that promised to cease if only he followed a few thousand negative thoughts to their conclusion. When he could see no way out something warm and soft took his hand and he remembered there had been something he had been doing before all hell had broken loose.

He could see again, and the first thing he saw were a pair of expressive blue eyes full of tears. Cool Mint held his hand, her grip weak and her body trembling.

Eric remembered. He had been doing nothing but feeling helpless. But now he had an idea of what he could do. He knew he was not the suitable host, but maybe, just maybe, Cool Mint's present state would demand little from him. The college kid had done it, right? Eric didn't have the love of goddesses to support him, but he didn't have a healthy angel to support either. Just for a little while. Somebody would come.

His voice came through in a croak, his throat seared and raw.

"Cool Mint. I'll take you."

Nothing happened. The angel just continued to look at him, her brow furrowed.

"Please. I'll... carry you."

He found he needed her with him. There was emptiness within and while she didn't have to fill it, she could at least watch it with him. It was selfish.

"I... I promise I'll..."

She was still not moving, either refusing him or unable. Since there were no other options but to quit or carry her as far as he could, he got to work.

Rind too was lighter than she looked, but he had to strain to take care as he picked her up and set her over one shoulder without jarring her. Then he scooped up Cool Mint with his left arm. To her credit, she reached up and put one arm around his neck, her other finding Rind and helping to keep her in place.

In the next movement he found that only his run up the hill had drained his strength, not the beast. His legs complained but were responsive, allowing his to rise to his feet and start walking. He could not be sure which way to go, but the last vestiges of twilight glimmered to his right and after a moment of tired disorientation he decided he was facing south. Angling a little to the left he started downhill. He could see road a hundred yards away, which he hoped to follow to the base of the mountain, where he then hoped to encounter someone who both spoke English and was not alarmed by the sight of a westerner carrying two women, one of them practically naked with a single damaged wing sprouting from her back. It was improbable, he admitted to himself, but how much more so than the idea of an average man waking up one morning and within an hour meeting the leader of Hell and being the most able of a group consisting of man, and angel, and a goddess after an encounter with a vast, semi-visible beast with yellow clouds for eyelids that peeled back to reveal...

_No!_

The visual memory, he guessed, would be debilitating after which he truly would be useless.

As though reading him, Cool Mint squeezed him with her right arm.

"I know."

Several more plodding steps down the mountain and, "You know, hundred miles is nothing. I can do ten in about three hours."

She squeezed him again.

"I'll get you home. I promise. I'll take you home."

With another step there was a flash of light and his left arm was empty. Eric fell to his knees and anguished present beside him in his mind.

"Atta girl," he croaked. "Sorry about the mess in there." He tired to get to his feet, his left arm free to help push off from the ground. His energy ebbing at a noticeable rate he was barely able to get upright before his knees began to shake violently.

"No worries. Just one step."

He took a step and stayed up.

"And another."

He took a second.

"We'll make it to Belldandy and—"

On the third his left knee buckled followed at once by his right. He fell.

* * *

Instead of the harsh, pebbly side of a mountain a bush broke his fall, halting him high enough up the he spun and tumbled out into an opening, onto dirt, but far softer than he had just been walking on. He tried to rise enough to get off of Rind's legs, pinned beneath him, but he was draining away and he could not understand where.

A girl's voice spoke to him short distance away. He rolled his eyes in the right direction and saw a young her pulling up the sleeves. Delusional, Eric thought he saw seams on her wrists. The girl seemed angry, her words unintelligible. It took him a beat to realize she was speaking Japanese. A mechanical sound took his attention elsewhere to the sight of a red and white bulbous robot with a wide hat, which it was taking off to reveal what looked like a missile launcher beneath.

"Help," Eric said.

Farther away came the sound of wood sliding against wood and a muted shout. Then footsteps, Eric could no longer move enough to look at where these were coming from. His consciousness gave out as hands reached him and rolled him over. The last thing he saw was a face from a dream.


End file.
